Truck Drivers Union Local No. 413 v. National Labor Relations Board

334 F.2d 539
CourtCourt of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
DecidedApril 9, 1964
DocketNos. 17662, 17663
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 334 F.2d 539 (Truck Drivers Union Local No. 413 v. National Labor Relations Board) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Truck Drivers Union Local No. 413 v. National Labor Relations Board, 334 F.2d 539 (D.C. Cir. 1964).

Opinion

J. SKELLY WRIGHT, Circuit Judge:

The National Labor Relations Board has found certain Picket Line, Struck Goods, Subcontracting, and Hazardous Work clauses in the collective bai’gaining agreements of petitioner unions void under Section 8(e)1 of the Labor Act. In their Petition to Review and Set Aside, the unions contend that these provisions are outside the prohibitions of § 8(e) because their aim is benefit to the employees of the bargaining unit, not control of, or interference with, the contract-ring employer’s third-party relationships. The Board cross-petitions for enforcement.

A preliminary issue is whether lit is the object, the effect, or the express or implied terms of the challenged clauses which are relevant to the § 8(e) charge. The unions suggest an object test, by parity of reasoning with § 8(b) (4) (B)’s secondary boycott provisions.2 The Trial Examiner, in one of these companion cases, No. 17,663, considered the effect of the clauses to be relevant to their validity under § 8(e), and took extensive evidence of their effect. The Board, however, at the instance of its General Counsel, held that the implementation of a contract was not relevant to its validity under § 8(e), that extrinsic evidence of object alone was not determinative, and that the contract must be tested by its terms, express or implied. See Mary Feifer, d/b/a American Feed Company, et al., 133 N.L.R.B. 214 (1961). We agree.

The Picket Line Clause

A key provision in the union contracts protects the right of individual employees to refuse to cross picket lines by immunizing them against employer discipline. This picket line clause is broadly worded to achieve maximum application permitted by the law. The Board held that under § 8(e) of the Act the clause may validly apply only to certain types of picket lines; the union apparently would apply it to all.

The clause provides:

“It shall not be a violation of this Agreement and it shall not be cause for discharge or disciplinary action in the event an employee refuses to enter upon any property involved in a labor dispute or refuses to go through or work behind any picket line, including the picket line of Unions party to this Agreement and including picket lines at the Employer’s place or places of business.”

The Board concedes that the contract clause may permissibly operate to protect refusals to cross a picket line where the line is in connection with a primary dispute at the contracting em[543]*543ployer’s own premises. This seems clearly correct. Employees who refuse to cross such a line are entitled to the same protection as strikers under Sections 7 3 and 13 4 of the Act. See N. L. R. B. v. John S. Swift Company, 7 Cir., 277 F.2d 641, 646 (1960). The refusal to cross being a protected activity, the union and the employer may provide by contract that such refusal shall not be grounds for discharge. See National Labor Relations Board v. Rockaway News Co., 345 U.S. 71, 80, 73 S.Ct. 519, 97 L.Ed. 832 (1953).

A different result must be reached where the picket line at the contracting employer’s own premises is itself in promotion of a secondary strike or boycott. Refusal to cross that line would itself be secondary activity. To the extent that the clause would protect such refusal to cross, it would then be authorizing a secondary strike, and would pro tanto be void under § 8(e) of the Act. There is no merit to the unions’ suggestion that this clause is outside the reach of § 8(e) because it protects individual refusals, not union-induced refusals. We read our own cases as having rejected this argument. See Los Angeles Mailers Union No. 9, Inter. Typo. U. v. N. L. R. B., 114 U.S.App.D.C. 72, 311 F.2d 121 (1962).

The Board also held that the clause may validly protect refusals to cross a picket line at the premises of another employer if that picket line meets the conditions -expressed in the proviso-to § 8(b) (4) 5 of the Act. Clearly this-is the law. See National Labor Relations Board v. Rockaway News Co., supra; Meier & Pohlmann Furniture Company v. Gibbons, 8 Cir., 233 F.2d 296, 301, cert. denied, 352 U.S. 879, 77 S.Ct. 101, 1 L.Ed.2d 80 (1956).

The remaining question concerns refusals to cross a picket line at another employer’s premises where that line does-not meet the conditions of the § 8(b) (4) proviso. The unions maintain that refusal to cross any lawful primary picket, line is primary activity under the Act. and that protection thereof in the bargaining agreement falls outside the ambit of § 8(e). The Board held that refusal to cross a non-proviso picket line-constitutes secondary activity, and that, contractual protection of such activity violates § 8(e).

A useful approach to this question is. through the legislative history of the-1959 amendments which incorporated § 8(e) into the Act. The House Labor-Committee report stated: “It is settled law that the National Labor Relations-Act does not require a truckdriver to-cross a primary picket line * * *. * * * [T]he employer could agree that he would not require the driver to enter-the strikebound plant.” House Committee-Report, 1 Legislative History of the; Labor-Management Retorting and Disclosure Act op 1959 at 779 (1959).6 It. [544]*544is also clear “that the right to refuse to cross a primary picket line would not be affected by” the hot cargo ban in the bill passed by the Senate. Kennedy-Thompson analysis, 2 id. 1708(2-3).7 “However, in order to set at rest false apprehensions on this score, the [House] committee appended the disclaimer proviso” which appears in the bill as reported by the House Committee.8 This disclaimer explicitly protected the right of refusal to cross primary picket lines, and the right to sign contracts immunizing such refusals from employer discipline.9 The entire House Committee bill, however, including this disclaimer, was replaced by the Landrum-Griffin substitute on the floor of the House. But the Landrum-Griffin substitute was unacceptable to the Senate conferees because: “[T]he House [Landrum-Griffin] bill apparently destroys the right to picket a plant and to honor a picket line even in a strike for higher wages. This change in the present law is entirely unacceptable.” 2 id. 1708(3). It seems clear that, at least on this point, the Senate viewpoint was adopted in conference, modifying the Landrum-Griffin version. The Senate conferees secured the insertion of the following broad and all-encompassing declaration of congressional policy in the bill: “Provided, That nothing contained in this clause (B) shall be construed to make unlawful, where not otherwise unlawful, any primary strike or primary picketing.” Section 8(b) (4) (B).

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